Calling the Bluff: Aging US Fleet and Drained Stockpiles No Match for China and Russia

The US Navy is being outpaced by China's rapidly growing fleet, facing challenges in terms of maintenance and shipbuilding capacity.

The US Navy faces delays in vessel repairs and a sluggish pace in construction of new warships.

The crisis was reported by the US Naval Institute (USNI) and the US Government Accountability Office (GAO), according to Asia Times.

Diana Maurer, Director of Defense Capabilities and Management at the Government Accountability Office, testified to the Senate Armed Services readiness subcommittee on May 1. She revealed that fewer than 40 percent of US Navy ships had completed repairs on time, despite available space in shipyards.

According to the GAO, "the Navy has not developed a full cost and schedule estimate for its Shipyard Infrastructure Optimization Program (SIOP) – an effort to improve its dry docks, facilities, and equipment – and reports that it will not be able to do so until Fiscal Year 2025."

Maurer signaled that shipyard conditions are second only to F-35 Lightning II sustainment costs, raising the alarm over the Navy's readiness.

In his own congressional testimony, Vice Chief of Naval Operations Admiral James Kilby acknowledged that issues related to "ship production and repair" rank among the top challenges confronting the US Navy today.

The US Navy's ship design practices are largely outdated, which contributes to the slower pace, less predictable costs and performance outcomes of warship construction when compared to commercial shipbuilding.

According to GAO, the Navy has been slow to embrace new design tools such as 3-D modeling and digital twinning, and still provides its contractors with 2D design data for legacy ship classes.

Shipbuilders also complain that the Navy is usually slow to provide vendor-furnished information (VFI) – the documents that shipyards need as input to engineering and design products – to feed digital models. The Navy's contractors want clearer technical tasks as well as funding for acquiring and implementing new digital tools.

The issue has been raised amid the US growing competition with China and the Biden administration's saber-rattling over the island of Taiwan and the South China Sea.

At the Senate panel's hearing, Republican Senator Dan Sullivan from Alaska lamented that the building of new submarines and surface warships in the US is well below the pace set by China.

Last July, a leaked US Navy intelligence briefing slide published by The War Zone revealed that China's shipbuilding capacity is 232 times greater than that of the US. While the People's Republic's shipyards have a capacity of over 23.2 million tons, the US capacity is less than 100,000 tons according to the leaked presentation, which was confirmed as authentic in September 2023 by a US Navy spokesperson.

The US Naval Institute admitted in 2021 that China already boasted the world's largest navy, while in February 2024, US Indo-Pacific Command (INDOPACOM) commander Admiral Samuel Paparo warned that Beijing was winning the shipbuilding numbers game.

According to Congress, China possesses approximately 370 warships, compared to the US fleet of 291 vessels. In 2023, China added 30 ships to its fleet, 15 of which were large surface combatants including cruisers, destroyers. and an additional aircraft carrier. By contrast, the US built only two warships last year.

The US Navy is also now struggling to build a fleet of unmanned vessels to counter China in the Pacific, while the Pentagon is committed to big shipbuilding projects.

The US Navy's significant shipbuilding and maintenance challenges, coupled with its lag behind China in terms of warship numbers, stand in stark contrast to the US administration's efforts to maintain its waning hegemony in the Asia-Pacific region.

The discrepancy is further compounded by Washington's doctrine of confronting both Russia and China at once. Both rising powers are able to produce more shells and military equipment than the US and its European allies. Russia makes nearly three times more artillery shells than the US and Europe combined, according to NATO's own intelligence estimates.

Given that US military stockpiles have been depleted by its proxy war in Ukraine, the prospect of war with China portends disaster for the US Navy.